Chapter One.
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One day, in the late brown season, I woke up.
I must have been four at the time, and my memory was a funny thing. You see, I knew nothing, and yet, when I saw people I was able to recognize them, my own name was not known until it was spoken but I knew it was mine.
I have no memory of any day before that one, but I remember it very well. We lived on a quiet farm, in the Tamore valley, nestled between the hills of the mountain goddess Andoe and every white season the village priest would offer thanks for her blessing. I think her ‘blessing’ was mainly that she didn’t send storms down upon us.
Our farm was banked by gigantic trees, and the leaves only grew in the green seasons, they would fall in the brown season and the ground was often deeper than I was tall in the golden leaves. During the brown season the clouds were painted like bronze coins; it was my favourite time of year, no matter the danger of being forever lost in the piles of leaves.
We lived on the ground, in a modest house of wood. There were four rooms in the house, the kitchen, my father’s dusty study, my room and my parent’s room. We farmed nuts from the forest that our house sat a step away from, and sold them to whoever wanted them; at markets, to travelers. The nuts grew all year round, although different kinds were available in different seasons. The nuts kept well, and our biggest demand was from travelers who dared to brave the furry of Andoe’s mountains in the white season.
The
My mother and father had magic, not great veins of it, but a good flow that churned through their bodies. I too had magic, but I had barely a silver of it, I could not even light a candle; my greatest, and most exhausting feat with my magic had been seeing my parent’s auras. They were both disappointed in my lack of power, but they accepted it as they accepted everything about me.
I was not an outstanding child. I was pretty, with short honey brown hair, hazel eyes and pale skin; my hips were beautifully curved, and not too small for bearing two children, but probably no more. There was no particular talent that I possessed, nor was there anything I was very bad at. I was like an empty canvas.
Since the day I first became self-aware, I knew only simple things. The village girls, perhaps, knew more than me. The village boys liked me well enough, but I had no interest in boys even when the other girls did. I enjoyed listening to the elders talk, and I was not a target of problems. I had little education, but I knew of the magic arts through my parents. I could read and write commendably because of my parent’s teaching. I knew very little of mathematics, and even less of countries and races. Our village was made up of settled Elves and a few Humans, half-Elf children were not uncommon. The Elves were like any normal human, the only relation between themselves and their true kindred were their long lives and sensitive ears. We had few non-Elven or Human travelers pass us through, and those that did rarely stayed long.
It was a simple life.
Then, when I was 15, life as I knew it stopped.
The Tamore valley was part of the
I remember that day as if it were life altering…
I overslept that morning, and mother did not wake me until well after breakfast. Father had cast bad fortunes and they were both disturbed. The stones had told of a coming evil, and a loss. I sat down to our late breakfast and tried to tune out the heavy silence. The day was cloudy, it was the end of the brown season and white would be beginning soon. The air was stagnate and the smells of the forest were stale. My father was bedraggled and his bushy brown hair was sticking up in every direction, his beard had crumbs in it from where he’d gulped down his food. Magic work was hungry business. Mother didn’t look that out of the ordinary, she was a little pale, and as she poured my cider she munched on a piece of cheese that she’d made not too long ago. It had been mum who woke me and in very hushed tones told me of their bad readings.
“I can’t remember a time when I ever got the stones this bad. It’s no storm, Lilly!” My father grumbled.
I nodded mutely. There was no sense arguing with him when he wanted to sort something out in his mind, which meant there was never any sense in arguing with him. I hadn’t bothered to argue with him in all my life. There was no satisfaction if you won against my father- he usually turned out to be right one way or another.
“I did it three times! The same each time… Andoe ain’t taken her blessing from the valley… the priest and old Margea across the river got completely different stones…” Dad went on.
Mum pressed her lips together tightly. They’d both gotten the strange stones.
I knew a little of the stones, Andoe blessed those with the magic power to see hints of the future in her stones. But the kind of omen to upset both mother and father was not something I could ever recall them getting. Well, I could never recall them having the same stones. This was a momentous event. Although I thought they should have rolled stones to see if this horrible fate were affecting me too. It’d be no good if it was just them.
“Is it something that’s going to happen to us, da’?” I finally asked. I was very tactful with my father. I had to be, no one else was.
The year before, Margea’s nephew had gotten really bad messages in his stones, and then he’d been killed that night while hunting. It had been a real tragedy too; Frenne said that Annef’s daughter was going to be wed to him. There weren’t enough babies around, the Elders had told everyone; we needed more babies to prosper as a town. I hadn’t thought it was a very good marriage anyway, Margea’s nephew wasn’t from the village, he came from some big kingdom, and was only here on a break from mage school. Of course, there was never any issue raised about me settling down with children, for whatever reasons, mum and dad had made it clear that I wasn’t to do such a thing. However strange it was; I didn’t care. There was no ache of boys in my life. They were boys, and they were workers. Never mind that other girls complained of ‘needing’ boys, and the human girls took glee in their monthly bleeding (something I found disgusting), I just figured the life of a wife wasn’t for me.
“Course it is!” He growled. He took a chug from his mug and set it down. Then he was gone from the table to do some work. He rarely got like this. I’d only seen it happen once before, and that was when I asked him who he and mum would be marrying me off to. I’d never asked again.
I ate the bread mum had baked earlier that morning and sipped my cider. “Can I have a shot at the stones?” I mumbled.
Mum picket up dad’s still full bowl and chuckled, a little lightened by my silly question. “No, Lillyanya, it wouldn’t be able to tell you anything, you know that, silly.”
It was a phrase I knew too well. But I didn’t mind. “Sure mum.”
“We’re making those cakes today.” She told me. Coffer cakes. They were nasty things to prepare, but they tasted wonderful, and they kept for months. Coffer nuts only grew in the brown season, and we’d gotten as many harvested as possible yesterday. The problem with Coffer cake making was that when the nuts were baked, they stank. They really stank.
I nodded and finished breakfast. The sun had been up for a while, and I was so unusually tired that I hardly noticed how weird it felt for the bright sphere to rise before me. My arms were like leaded weights, and I thought I might need to sleep the rest of the day away.
I went up to my room to change into day clothing, and that was when the knocking came.
The sound was so heavy and loud that for a moment I thought the door had been knocked down but the pounding just kept going.
How rude.
I let mother answer the door while I changed in my room and scrubbed my face with the basin of cold water therein. The water refreshed me a bit.
Mum answered the door and I heard even more noise downstairs. There was the sound of booming voices and, for a minute I thought I heard the chanting of priests. Mum was screaming at the top of her lungs, and I could hear her shrill voice wonderfully.
“GET OUT YOU STUPID GOBLIN!”
I ran a brush through my hair and decided to find out what the goblins wanted. Of course, I doubted there really were goblins downstairs. Mum called everyone a goblin if she didn’t like them. Sometimes she went through days where everyone was a goblin, even dad. Although I didn’t think this was one of those days… yet.
As I came out of my room I was surprised by what I found. The men were massive, like bears, and their muscles were all corded and sharp, their armor was molded onto them like liquid and I couldn’t see any chinks. There was a strange dragon on the breast plates; pressed on with real gold. Each man had a massive sword-a broadsword I assumed- in their sheaths. The leather was dark and evenly dyed. Their helms were shiny and they had miniature wing like sculptures. Behind these massive giants were smaller men, adorned in simple robes of brown wool. I wasn’t fooled by the smaller men- they must have been mages. The front of the robes had the same crest that the breast plates did. They looked like the kind of expensive soldiers that nobles hired. I’d seen men like this pass through on their way to the mountain. I’d seen them come back with frostbite is stupid places.
Mother was shouting at one of the gigantic men, who was quite handsome with his lively blue eyes and blonde locks of lion mane hair. He stood at the front of the dozen giants; he was the only one who didn’t seem to have a rank partner. I figured these men were half-human half-giant in origin. Perhaps they were all brothers.
“YOU HORRIBLE SERVANTS OF THE UNDERWORLD!” She screamed again at something the man said back.
I didn’t have a clue what was going on here, but I didn’t really feel like getting involved. I turned to go back to my room but was halted in my tracks by a gruff voice yelling at me.
“Halt, girl!”
I winced and turned, there was no escape now. I would have to come into the room and greet everyone properly.
Resigned, I marched forward and curtsied. “Good day, gentle travelers.”
“Who’s the lass?” The blonde man asked mum, he jerked a thumb in my direction while he scanned me with critical eyes.
I felt like puffing my chest out and batting my eyes and saying ‘get a bard to draw me, so you have something to remember’ but that was bad manners.
“She’s got nothing to do with this, run along down darling.” Mum ushered me toward the kitchen. I’d go in there, but I wasn’t going to start on the cakes alone.
The blonde man halted her hand with his own big palms. “Look, woman. The ceremony starts in seven days, it’s a three day trip back- if the journey isn’t as rough as it was getting here- and we have to take her or the whole kingdom will fall into anarchy. When you were given this gift, you knew you’d have to give her back at some point.”
Mother stiffened. She was really riled up. “Now listen here, you overbearing oaf! I won’t have this talk in my house! She’s not the girl you’re looking for so move on!”
I inched my way closer to the kitchen, although now I was getting interested. The mage’s were talking quietly among themselves and glancing around the house in some sort of fascination. I caught words like ‘she really lives in this drab little place’ and ‘this isn’t the right house is it?’. Whoever they were looking for, it was obvious they weren’t in the right place. Clear as day to me.
The blonde bear obviously had enough of mum’s stubbornness as quick as lightening he drew his sword and leveled it at her.
“I’m only going to ask one more time, woman. Lillyanya! Where is she?”
This certainly stopped me. These brutes were looking for me? Whatever for? I had never seen them before in my life.
Mum let out a little scream and backed up. She wasn’t used to being threatened with a sword.
I was rooted in my place, worried that the blonde assailant would kill my mother, and frozen in terror of these ogres working for a demonic summoner of some kind.
Courage that I didn’t know I had stepped up inside of me. It wasn’t polite of someone to barge into a man’s house and not introduce himself when told good day. The courage that welled inside me was fueled by rage, how dare someone threaten my mother!
Never before in my life had I felt this kind of power, it was a physical power, not a magical one, yet in a way it did feel magical, because I straightened my shoulders and lifted my chin. Just because someone was noble, didn’t mean they were righteous.
I licked my lips and walked right up to the towering sword holder. My legs shook, and it was an effort not to run as I came right up to him and spoke clearly. My voice didn’t betray itself and shake, but that must have been a miracle. All I could think was ‘he’s not really so big up close.’ My courage had me moving and looking brave, but it didn’t have me feeling brave.
“When a girl says ‘good day’ it is hardly polite to pull a sword on her ma’ before answering.” I bellowed up at him.
The room descended into silence for the longest time. My heart was beating so fast I thought I might explode. The ogre was going to turn around and cut me to ribbons and that would be the end of me! Little old, unmarried Lillyanya, splattered all over the nice wooden floor.
I was just preparing for the finishing blow when I heard it.
Laughter.
I opened my eyes and realized that all the other giant men were cracking up with laughter, even a few of the mages were chuckling to themselves.
The relief that had been beginning to uncoil in my stomach suddenly stopped when the blonde man whirled on me, a frown on his face.
Oh my, I thought, at least he’s a nice looking man, it’s better to be killed by a well washed man then a mangy bandit.
But since I was dying, I might as well do it right. “Well, don’t just stand there waving your big stick around. Didn’t your mum teach you manners? When a lass says ‘good day’ you say ‘good day’ back.” I swallowed and met his steady gaze face on I had never felt more scared in my life, but I was still upset that he’d threatened my mother. I was brave. I was brave. I was not still feeling brave.
My whole body was trembling, though I hoped it wasn’t terribly noticeable.
“And…” he began. I thought I should listen closely, because these were the last words I’d ever hear.
There was mum, staring at me in amazement. I hope she remembered me when I was dead.
“… who might you be, lass?” He finished.
I opened my mouth, closed it, and then spat out the first thing that came to mind. “You’re still not getting it right!” I howled.
I balled my hands into my dress to keep from shaking and took a deep breath before I pointed at the door.
“Out! Until you learn how to greet a girl good and proper, I don’t want to see your likes in my dad’s house!” My bravery held strong for a few moments, in which the blonde man stepped back, completely off guard, and all the other giant men roared with laughter.
“You heard the lass, Anno! Out you go! Don’t worry, we’ll handle it!” They called. “Careful, she might bite you, Anno!”
“… good day, lass.” The blonde man ground out finally.
I nodded and then my knees gave out and I sat on the floor and tried to get my breathing under control as the house roared with the laughter of the giant men and the quiet mages.
“Lilly!” Mum shouted and rushed over to me. She wrapped her arms around my shoulders and hugged me fiercely. I could feel her shaking and her face was going red from the effort not to cry.
I shook my head. “I don’t like seeing you bullied, mum.”
“I like this lass, Anno, she’s got fire like
I stared at his hand. “I’d rather die here, if it’s all the same, sir.”
More laughter rippled through the room, and I felt so embarrassed that I had to hide my head in mum’s shoulders. It wasn’t meant to be funny!
“What’s your name lass?” Anno, the blonde, asked again, his voice was all embarrassed and choked.
“Lillyanya Wernth.” The silence that accompanied those words was stunning enough to hear a needle drop.
“She can’t be!” one of the mages roared. “There’s not even a speck of magic in her!”
“Well that’s my name. And it’s not such a bad thing; magic doesn’t mean you have everything. I suppose you can’t sacrifice me to your demonic masters then. And there’s no one else in the village with much magic either.” I added, just for good measure.
“Did she just call The Lady a demonic master?” The black man asked after that.
“What the hell happened to her magic! By rights she should be brimming with it! Did you steal it woman?” One of the mages glared hatefully at mother.
I was confused. “What exactly does magic have to do with any of this?”
“Do you know anything of the Des’Orda kingdom?” The black man asked me, not unkindly.
I shook my head. “I know that’s where the royalty is. But it’s no interest of mine.”
“Where the royalty is! By the Gods! Woman, have you taught her nothing?”
The room was beginning to get noisier now, the giants and the mages were speaking angrily among themselves and pointing around the house and yelling at mother.
I felt a second burst of anger, and although I was still on my knees from the effects of the first one, I felt steadier down here.
“Now listen here you brutes. I don’t care what your business is, but you’ve got no right to enter a man’s home and insult his wife like this. If my dad was here, he’d right off blow the lot of you out. And we won’t be giving you any supplies for your little trek up the mountain. Good Day!”
Then the chaos ended. Anno, shouted something in some other language, the black giant rolled his eyes, reached down, wrapped his hands easily around my hips and hoisted me up and into the air, turned around and plunked me down right in the middle of a circle made up of the giants and one of the mages.
Mum screamed, and jumped after me, but she obviously couldn’t even budge the giant men. They barely even blinked when she beat her fists against their broad backs.
The black man let go of me and dropped his hands his side, like all the other giants.
I turned around the little circle, and found that I was completely surrounded by a sea of giants and there was no way to get through them except for the mage, who was the weaker of the circle.
The mage lifted his hands and magic shivered to life in the room.
My heart caught in my throat and I was suddenly very still. My head was empty and I felt like a doll, waiting for my strings to be pulled.
The mage murmured a few words, and a little silver orb of magic appeared in his hand, he looked up, right at me, and I noted dully that his look was one of hate, before the orb flew right at me.
The white orb hit me square in the chest, and sent me flying back into the unyielding bodies of the giant men.
I think what happened next was what they call ‘generation’ magic. The ability to see the past of your family in the blink of an eye. For I was suddenly in a white marble palace, and I was incredibly beautiful, there were jewels all over me, and my dress was so elaborate and expensive that it was like pure magic. My forehead had a diamond embedded in it, and it was my birth mark. My throat had an identical diamond that only differed in color, and it too was my birth mark. And on my chest, viewable through the way my dress fell around my body, was a third birth mark and it was a larger diamond. Suddenly I was a much younger woman, and I was in a stunning throne room, only two of my birth marks were visible, and there was a crown that fitted exactly over my forehead diamond, it was gorgeous gold. Next I was a girl with hair so blonde it was almost white, and I only had a diamond on my throat, and then as that girl I was in the white marble room and there were two other girls who had the missing diamonds and we clasped hands and were one girl with all three diamonds and complete in mind. My final vision was of an equally attractive woman giving birth. It was horrendously painful, and before my eyes there were three baby girls squeezed out of her. The first of the three had a diamond on its chest. The mother was weeping as she nodded at the midwife holding this one.
And then I was lying on the floor of my house, staring up at the thatched ceiling and trying desperately to breathe. My chest was so heavy that I thought it would collapse in. Tears rolled from my eyes at the incredible pain I was in, and dimly, I heard my mother screaming obscenities.
I lay like that for what seemed like forever, feeling the foreboding presence of the giant man just near me. The ache in my chest bled away, but the strange throbbing did not. In what felt like a dream I lifted my hand and touched my chest. There was a hole in my clothing and through it my fingers met crystal. Confused, I traced the outline of the crystal, trying to figure out where it ended, and my flesh began. It took me the longest time to figure out it was actually attached to me.
“…what is it?” I finally asked. I was afraid I already knew.
“It’s a diamond.” I heard the blonde, Anno, tell me.
I think that’s when I started screaming.